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Ederic Rutherford
Lord''' Ederic Rutherford', also known as '''Silver Ed', is the erstwhile Viscount of Godric's Redoubt (Having lost that holding with the conquest of Arathor) and head of House Rutherford. His family's arms are three yellow roses on emerald. Character and Appearance A tall man with a stately air about him, Ederic is handsome with high cheekbones, grey eyes and lustrous blonde hair, worn slicked back. A thick moustache and short beard is present on his face, kept expertly groomed. He seems to be in his very early forties. His posture is excellent, his back straight and upright, and he walks with a certain elegant bearing and conviction. His speech is structured as if he were a well-educated man, however it is accented with the provincial, perhaps even coarse tones of Stromgarde. Ederic was born to a relatively poor and unimportant lord in the peaks of Arathor, whose holdings were bleak, their only industry stone quarried from the mountains. Despite this, he received an excellent education and has spent his life trying to rise above his position, his ambition almost limitless. He possesses considerable skill in administration and diplomacy and is a master of court intrigue, his ability to persuade and connive with his elaborate speech and silver tongue granting him the nickname of Silver Ed. He is the first cousin, on his mother's side, of the great paladin Sir Thalder, called Manaweave. He is known to have one true-born son, whose name is Zachary. He also possesses of a bastard daughter, Isabella, and likewise had an illegitimate son who is popularly believed to have died in a hunting accident. Recent Events After the final battle of the March on the Highlands, Ederic sailed southwards to Stormwind from the port of Faldir's Cove with the refugees, providing what aid he could to them and emptying his coffers to feed them. While his own meagre territories were left relatively untouched by the war, his family's loyalties were unfailingly to the state of Arathor. As a result, he quickly enlisted to the forces of Duke Mathilan Lionblood, who he believed at the time was the greatest hope for the realm. He quickly found himself disagreeing with Lionblood's forces' attitudes. In the absence of the Duke, his officers had undertaken back-alley peace negotiations with the Forsaken, in Ederic's eyes practically licking their boots and attempting to justify their invasion of Arathor. To Rutherford, peace with the Forsaken was an anathema to justice. He saw them as abominations, and after one incident in which an opportunity to rescue a prisoner of war was cast aside for fear of discontenting the Dark Lady's soldiers, he cast down his badge and relinquished his oaths to Lionblood in the presence of Guincey Thomas and Alison Clement, stating that he would go and swear his fealty to a 'kingdom with a backbone'. Ederic did as he said he would and in a rage stole a destrier from the camp, riding northwards to the encampment of the League of Lordaeron in the Eastern Plaguelands. Expressing his desire to join the League as a private, he was interviewed by Valoree Brightburn and inducted into the esteemed military regiment. In an escort through the Alterac Mountains, he failed to defend Brightburn from a rogue witch and was soundly defeated and wounded by her magic. This planted the seeds of doubt into his mind and as a result he became convinced that a soldier's life was not for him. After residing in Hearthglen for a time and experiencing several battles fighting under the banner of the League, one of which resulted in the death of a local Alteraci landowner who styled himself Lord Oakridge, Ederic became more and more discontented with his lot in life and eventually asked the head of the League, Lady Demitria, to relinquish him of his vows, not making the same mistake of walking out on his last oath. She consented, and he subsequently sent a writ of resignation and rode back to Godric's Redoubt, finished with life as a military man. Crossing the Thandol Span and making way through the mountain passes to Stormwind City once more, a journey that took him seventeen nights, Ederic was immediately provided shelter in an Old Town brothel by his dubious cousin Oliver, an owner of several such establishments around the Eastern Kingdoms. Once there he began to formulate a plan of action, eventually composing a strategy to return Arathi to Grand Alliance hands and unify the fractious peerage under one banner. He conspired with Altrias Lighsander and his old colleague Alison Clement, the latter of which he successfully convinced to lay claim to her family's estate, to place a regent on the throne of Arathor with the nobility's popular support. This regent was to be Baereus Williams, a somewhat unwilling claimant for their plot. The Bishop of Stormwind, Johannes Moorwhelp, was convinced by Ederic to support the plan, if not in deed in word. For a while Ederic sailed around Baradin Bay garnering as many signatures of the peerage as he could for the Declaration of Regency he and his fellow conspirators had written, seeking to gain unanimous support for his document. Endeavouring to solve what petty disputes amongst Stromgarde's nobility he could and to convince feuding houses to work together, he was at last called back to Stormwind. When there, Williams told him that he would not stand for the regency on account of an unwillingness to, in his eyes, forsake his family. Unable to find another claimant that would have gathered enough support and favour from the nobles, his nascent plot though well-intentioned was rendered dead in the water. Throughout the course of the events Williams' son had continually opposed Ederic, viewing him as naught more than a paper-pushing beauracrat hungry for power. In actuality, while the former was an accurate assessment of the man, the latter was an untruth, for Rutherford had honestly believed that by unifying Stromgarde under the banner of a strong leader such as Williams and repelling the Forsaken invaders he had the realm's best interests at heart and as a result he would finally win from his peers the respect he felt he deserved. Feeling led adance by Williams and abandoned by Lighsander, Ederic secluded himself and began drinking more heavily than he used to, becoming jaded to the outside world. When Lighsander was apparently poisoned, Rutherford was suspected, though he denied all involvement in the event and spat in his accuser's face, proclaiming that 'if I did know who was responsible, I would thank him for the service he did me and the world for ridding us of such a cretin'. Lighsander did, however, survive. After weeks of contemplation and worse drinking, Ederic began to feel remorseful and confessed his past sins to Father Thomas Hohenheim, who suggested to him that to complete penance in the eyes of the Light he must adopt a destitute lifestyle for fourteen days, wearing a postulant's garb and eating only bread and water. Ederic undertook Hohenheim's suggestion in Northshire Abbey. His current whereabouts are unknown. Category:Characters Category:Human Category:Stromic Category:Stromgarde Peerage Category:House of Rutherford